I am back to the playdough again over here! I tell you, my friend, is there anything that can not be taught through playdough? These FREE Printable Letter Playdough Mats and Number Playdough Mats might just be my favorite so far.

A few weeks ago, I shared my Human Body Playdough Mats with you, which are amazing tools for learning all about the circulatory, respiratory, skeletal, and nervous systems. (Those are a FREE printable as well, so pop on over to grab them!) It was right about that time when my love for teaching with playdough was rekindled!

Before I shared with you the Human Body Playdough Mats, I had shared some letter and number playdough mats. But they were not very lovely. And I do love it when things look beautiful.

So now we have some beautiful ones! And to thank you for being YOU, I wanted to offer them to you for free!

I know times are hard for many families right now, and these little playdough mats wrapped up with some homemade playdough (I have an awesome No-Cook Recipe!) would be a wonderful gift for any little one to receive.

Once you print these alphabet and number playdough mats out, there are a couple of options for how to make them perfect for playdough play.

1. You can put them inside a clear ‘page protector’ and tape the bottom.
2. You can use clear sticky shelf liner and place it over the front and back of the printable.
3. You can use clear contact paper the same way!

Now these printable playdough mats will be set for hours and hours of endless play.

Let me tell you a little bit about what you are getting:

Free Printable Alphabet Playdough Mats

The alphabet playdough mats include all of the letters of the alphabet. I would suggest beginning by printing out just your child’s name letters. But of course, you could print out the entire alphabet if you prefer.

The letters include a ‘dot’ inside each one. This dot is to help your little one (and you as well) remember where to begin when forming the letters.

The Order for Teaching Letter Recognition

After you have printed off your little one’s name letters and they have had time to play with them and know how to say the letter name and the letter sound, I suggest introducing the letters in a very special order. This is the order I use for everything around here!

All of my resources and all of my blog posts follow this same order for introducing and teaching letters to children. The first grouping of letters is: s, a, t, i, p, n. You can find out more about this and receive my free guide on the topic here: Teaching Letter Recognition. 

I hope you love these free printable alphabet playdough mats!

Free Printable Number Playdough Mats

The number playdough mats are loads of fun for introducing many big math concepts to little ones through play. They include the numbers 0 – 10.

How to Use a Making 10 Chart

Each number mat also includes a making ten chart. This chart can be used in so many different ways! In fact, I wrote a whole blog post on this topic as well. You can check out some fun games right here: Making Ten Games for Preschoolers. 

When you are using the making ten chart, encourage your little one to fill it as they would reading a book. Starting in the top left corner, moving across the squares to the right, and then moving down to the bottom left corner and, again, filling the squares to the right. This visual is a very powerful teaching tool to help children understand number sense.

My goodness… who would have thought one person could have so much to say about some playdough mats!! Are you ready to grab your set?

Ready to teach your little one how to write? How Wee Write is my complete learn-to-write program, now also available in a cursive writing edition!

How Wee Write gently guides your child through pre-writing skills, proper letter formation, and writing sentences, building their writing stamina one letter at a time. Grab your copy today!

I hope you love it, my sweet friend!

xo
Sarah